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Monday, March 12, 2018

New York Yankees manager Aaron Boone made the team's fifth starter announcement on Friday but there was not much suspense leading up to the decision to say the least. That is because the Yanks pretty much knew all along that emerging prospect Jordan Montgomery would be the guy and a 1.04 ERA and 11 K's in 8.2 IP this spring (prior to his Sunday outing) which made the decision moot. Thus, Montgomery will get a chance to post an encore to this very impressive 2017 rookie campaign where he seemingly came out of nowhere to post the following numbers:

9-7
3.88 ERA
1.23 WHIP
144 K in 155.1 IP

Don't forget that Montgomery was a rookie pitching in the always tough AL East and so his numbers should be given even more respect based on that premise. What is interesting is that in a farm system that is beyond loaded with high-end talent, Montgomery was not considered to be a blue-chip arm. Be that as it may, the 25-year-old is quickly settling into a firm rotation spot with the juggernaut Yankees and so his immediate fantasy baseball outlooks seems quite promising.

When you dig into the numbers a bit, it is obvious that Mongtomery has a knack for missing bats despite a fastball that averaged just 92.1 a year ago. The key is that Montgomery gets good movement on his pitches which generates a decent amount of swings-and-misses. This is a crucial skill to have in operating in the AL East and Mongtomery has it. Montgomery also really helps himself by having decent control (2.95 BB/9) to further keep batters off the bases. A high 1.22 HR/9 is a bit of a red flag but in deeper fantasy baseball formats, Mongtomery has the stuff to be worth a late-round upside grab.

While we overall don't see Mongtomery bursting out into stardom, we do see a useful SP 5 who will be in line to win a high amount of games, while also supplying decent ratios and around 165 K's. That will work.